Is there a cupboard in the White House in which the Council keeps the Councillors who are a danger to democracy?

Has one escaped the armed guards, scaled the barbed wire and shrugged off the straight jacket and gag, only to let let rip with the kind of comment which will have the Press Officer banging his head off the desk, and the lawyers writing suicide notes?

In the great spirit of the democratic system, public and civic responsibility and the maturity to make a decision based on the facts, ones understanding of the circumstances: and all tempered with the nuances of beliefs, public interest and a sense of judgement; the ability to ditch all of those and drop you colleagues into an expensive and embarrassing position whilst trying to avoid taking any kind of stance takes some doing.

Step forward Cllr Murdo MacLeod to receive the Arse-from-Elbow award for ludicrous decision avoiding.  The prize is a large pair of pliers to remove the splinters from the fence from your backside.

Unwilling to take a stand either for or against the application for a Sunday licence at Stornoway Golf Club, in true fashion he praised both sides and feigned an inability to come to a conclusion so as to try to offend no-one.

"This is not a cop out.  I have to abstain."

Hear that noise?  It's the bullshit detectors exploding.

You never HAVE to abstain, unless he is implying some kind of conflict of interest that he didn't declare.  Just what was the position of the Free Church of which he is a Deacon?  Should he perhaps have declared an interest and not participated?

He conceded that the club would be "highly likely" to win an appeal.

WTF?  He is pretty sure that the Licencing Board are taking the wrong decision, yet he allows the decision to go the 'wrong' way and encourages an appeal that he thinks the applicants will win.  Oh yes, and we the public will pick up the tab of perhaps £15,000 in that event.  But that's not important enough to take a stand about?

Now imagine the appeal by the Golf Club, and the Board having to write their defence of the decision.  Just how will Cllr MacLeod defend his view that the Board were wrong and their decision should be overturned, yet not feeling any obligation to prevent a waste of people's time, energy and money on something that he thinks was "highly likely" to be wrong.  And how will his colleagues on the Board appreciate him undermining them?

Of course, he has form in this area.  As a vocal and highly public opponent of Sunday transport to the islands, he was previously caught taking a secretive private Sunday flight on a Council sponsored trip to the US to go and see some tourist sights.  And let's not mention using another Councillors pin number to access executive lounges, so other Councillors could get the free booze.

Time to close that door again and double the guards.